Pathway
by Razer Athane
Summary: "But I'm alive," he spits back, tilting his head slightly. -Oneshot-


Disclaimer: Nope, don't own Kingdom Hearts.

Author's Note: That time of the year again. Another fanfic comp. This is my first entry, I'll be putting in an additional two, particularly seeing as this year there's no fandom restrictions. I digress though, the idea for this came from talking with TeaC0sy. Good shit. Anyway hope you enjoy. I'll let you know how I go :3

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><p><strong>PATHWAY<strong>

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><p>He's fading.<p>

He's fading as he lies by the side of the road, struggling to move or to breathe, as he watches the colourful lights become brighter and darker through his disorientated and unfocused eyes. There's voices, undistinguishable in their vast numbers - or is it complete silence? He can't quite tell - and he wonders if Isa's around, or if he has heard the news.

When he feels down, he sometimes takes walks, because it calms him. If he's feeling angry, he just picks himself up and goes, watching all sorts of things pass him by as his sneakers slide over the asphalt. If his mother's screaming at him again for some odd reason - and he doesn't want to deal with her drinking issues right now - then he opens the door and leaves, not daring to look back or return to the place of his undoing until night has well and truly arrived, cloaking the quiet Twilight Town in an eerie shadow.

It's too dark tonight, and the train driver certainly didn't see red hair bobbing along the side of the road, silently exhaling and letting those maternal screams pass through him. He certainly couldn't find the breaks or the horn or the ability to veer off to the opposite direction, because he'd gone off the track – he didn't notice that the tracks are broken. It'd been too late when the vehicle collided with the youth, who was perhaps only eleven years of age. The passenger's screams would haunt the driver forever, who had been too spineless and too afraid to stay behind at the scene.

The youth lying by the tracks, still dazed, blinks a little, trying to make sense of the shadowy figures hovering above him. The edges of his sight are tainted by a black, fuzzy ring. To them, he is certain that he is nameless - an innocent boy who'd been keeping to himself, to be struck by tragedy. His chest heaves as he tries to collect more oxygen, but with every second that ticks by, he finds it all the more difficult to do so. In a brief moment of curiosity, his mind wanders away - what would his Mother say? Or would she be too busy downing another bottle, because she loves the drink more than she loves her own son?

"...maybe eleven..." he hears, and he wonders if it's a paramedic. Is that a hand on his arm? Why's he being moved? It's too comfortable here on the ground, despite being surrounded by his own blood and despite the discomforting pain he feels. He'd move himself if he could find the strength in his arms, but he feels like a limp doll, incapable of moving without assistance. Maybe he'd need a machine to help him breathe too, because it feels like his lungs are giving out - is his heart heading that way too?

No, his heart's doing something else. He just can't identify what. Everything else is shutting down except for that.

He wants to live.

"...I know him!" somebody shouts, and it's as clear as day through the night. The clouds above are masking a light source - the moon - and he'd like it to come out so he has something to stare at for a while. They're yelling to who he assumes is the paramedic, and her long hair whips towards the origin of the voice, "He's the boy that likes to play around with the Frisbee a lot after school. His name is Lea..."

_Lea..._

He wants to live. He is _going _to live.

His mouth's going dry as a second figure - another paramedic, perhaps? - presses two fingers harshly against his throat, seeking a beat. There's more alarmed noises, and they're carrying him now - "I can barely feel his pulse! Get him into the ambulance!" - but Lea doesn't want to be carried. He might be a doll, but his will is so strong that he can get _himself _to move anyway - damn the median! Damn the median, damn his mother for thinking it was okay to scream at a son who had nothing but love for her, and damn the train driver for not paying attention.

Red stands out in the dark... right?

Red in the dark... doesn't always have to mean blood, or anger, or hate.

More voices, more noises, more shocked gasps, and Lea's on the ground again, a metal bar pressing hard against his spine. What's left of his mind says that it should sting, but physically, he can't really feel it. He assumes its probably just adding on top of the pain of the collision anyhow. What did that feel like again? That felt like so long ago, that pain. Time's going by slowly - is he moving again? It feels like he's moving again, twitching even - or are they picking him up once more?

"What on earth is going on?"

He wants to live. There's too much to do and too much to see. He wants to go on that rollercoaster with Isa and scream at the top of his lungs, because he loves the adrenaline rush, and maybe when he's at the top, he can open up his water bottle and laugh at those below him at the sudden bout of manmade rain. Or he could spit. Either of those would work. Either would work, as long as he got a laugh out of it. He still hadn't tried that new ice cream yet, the one that'd been released only a week or two ago. He's heard good things about it.

"He's not breathing!"

He is _going _to live. He can guarantee that. He wants to experience those things. He wants to laugh at the nerd who will cop his spit wad from the top of the rollercoaster, and then go back to enjoying the ride with a smile and with his best friend. He wants to feel the coolness of the treat, he wants to identify the taste on his taste buds and then judge whether or not it is awesome or worth his time. He wants to at least _try_.

"Glowing... changing... what?"

He _will _live.

And then there's light. Everything is clear.

_I'm Lea. And I'm not going_ anywhere_._

There's black light - wait, when did he suddenly stand? How can he even - climbing up his legs, cloaking his pants in the same colour. It continues to crawl, and it feels as though his bones are shifting within his body, elongating, becoming heavier - and his body's shifting to accommodate the changes. Something's burning - is that the right word or description for it? He's not entirely sure, but whatever it is, it's hurting his cheeks. He wishes he could distinguish each feeling; it's almost as though the clear feelings he felt earlier have become how he saw the world, where as the world was muddy and hazy, but is now clear. He sees the paramedics for who they are. He sees the spectators, the passengers of the train, and children's eyes being covered because the parents don't know what else to do, or what's going on.

"His heart!"

He dares to look down, and shock writes itself across his face. He can see it. It's pink and glowing and it's escaping his grasp - and why is he now in black garments? - and its ascending into the sky, spinning in silence. That's _his _heart, it shouldn't be leaving, because _he needs _that to live, right? Why the hell is it leaving him? He's not dead, clearly - he's standing and his breathing, and people can see him and they don't know what's going on, just like him.

And with the childish mind he still has, he jumps and reaches for it, trying to grab it at all costs.

It eludes him with ease, fading into the night. And then he feels nothing. The lights have stopped.

He feels a lot taller. Lea gazes down at the people, now feeling equal in height to those around him. He's not that short kid that goes to that school with that blue-haired freak. He exhales sharply and breathes in thereafter, making sure that at the very least he's alive, somehow. He raises his arms to stretch and notices that they're swallowed by black sleeves and black gloves, and his fingers are most certainly longer and bonier than they were when he hit the ground with a thud. He mutters something under his breath - at least his voice is the same, sort of. A bit deeper. Maybe a bit older, if age can be determined by one's voice. It even feels like he's changed how he thinks. He sees now what he could not see before.

He looks over his shoulder and feels more hair swish by than what he's accustomed to - it's to his shoulders instead of standing tall. Not sure what he should do, he runs from the scene, looking for that small, nearby waterfall, so he can at least see himself in a reflective surface. He needs a reflective surface, he needs to see what's happened, he needs to see what else has changed or been added. He needs to... try and understand. And so he runs.

Behind him, he can hear phone calls. He can hear shuffling. He can hear whispers. Secrets. Stories.

_Nobody._

And when he gets there... he wonders why his stomach doesn't drop, and why so many other emotions that he should feel aren't there. Where is sorrow? Where is shock and its friend horror? Where have they gone? Why does his throat remain open, instead of tightening to the point where he struggles to breathe because he's been overpowered with those emotions? ...Or were they all in his heart? What was he now, without his heart?

A wanderer? A lost soul?

_Nobody._

Before him is not a boy, but a man. A man in black, with tears inked into his cheeks, and a stoic disposition. And there is no fear that seizes him.

A kid has joined him by the waterfall, tugging at the bottom of his clothing, trying to get his attention. He looks, noting how the child's round face seemingly brightens and how his hand falls away, adjusting his red cap. The boy smiles a little and asks if he's okay, and not really knowing what else to do, Lea offers a stiff nod. He then asks, "How are you feeling?"

The question stops him, and he feels his hands tighten.

How does he... _feel?_

Can he even feel anymore? Why didn't he feel shock when he saw what he became? What is he now, an emotionless beast?

_Nobody._

His eyebrows furrow together, glaring at where the child had been - his mother's long since pulled him away, and it's here that he realises the crowd's migrated from the train wreck to this little secluded spot. They're watching in silence, their eyes like little stars. Little, confused stars. Little, confused stars that really shouldn't be standing there, because if Lea could feel, he's sure that he'd be feeling extremely uncomfortable right now.

He lost his heart and his emotions. They were _his – _where did they go? Why did they leave? Why was he no longer whole? Did he lose his name, too?

"You should be dead," a man utters, not out of disrespect, but out of sheer shock.

In response, having misinterpreted the statement, he turns the upper half of his body and glares with his green eyes. He raises his left arm swiftly, and there's something stirring at the end, something hot and tameless - and when it takes form, he sees it for what it is as it catapults itself towards the man. As it crashes into the stone and fades into nothing. As what remains of it flickers about, like a lizard's tongue, on the grassy ground below their feet. There's a black smudge on the wall, but it is not the man who spoke - he had leapt out of the way, and the crowd's been bisected by the ball of fire, their voices shrilly and shaky, and they are so wary of him now. He is powerful, he realises. Strong, too.

"But I'm alive," he spits back, tilting his head slightly, and he feels so much larger than the man who dared to question his existence.

Alive with no heart and no name.

_NOBODY!_

There's a voice that whispers in the wind, passing through what's left of him. He inhales deeply, feeling the word infect every part of him, until it is deeply ingrained in his mind - and it's here that it keys in. It's a name. It's his name. It's his _new name _for his _new life that_ he was gifted with. Inside, he knows that the smaller version of himself doesn't exist anymore, at least physically - he's entirely new. And he's not going anywhere.

The man hisses, "What demon are you?"

A smirk. A laugh. A small twinge of _emotion, _somewhere, somehow, buried deep inside him. Maybe he can follow that and find his heart again, somewhere and somehow. Wherever it vanished.

"The name's Axel," Lea - now Axel - snits, summoning more fire, feeling it dance across his fingertips. He feels a part of Lea inside of him still, though, as he continues, his trademark line and trademark attitude sifting through his new personality, his new being, his new _everything,_ "A-X-E-L. Got it memorized?"

As they scatter and scream, he throws out the fire, carving crescent moons into the sky that are as wide as his now sinister smirk.

_There are no happy endings, _he thinks, contemplating on how he should feel with his second chance, _because nothing ever ends._


End file.
